Is it the approach of his 30th birthday (and that’s still three years off) that is making Mac DeMarco so melancholy? Not to suggest that the wonder boy of the American indy scene has lost any of his boyish humour, his off-beam stories, his radiant second-hand guitars and his joyful and rickety synths: just that the general tone of This Old Dog was marked by a certain detachment, or a somewhat pensive mood... His mini-album Another One of 2015 already had about it some of the flavour of this 2017 vintage. All the DeMarco hallmarks are there, to be sure. In particular, his dead-eye sense of melody, which will have us humming in our next few thousand showers... More acoustic, and less electric than he has been, the Canadian plays with bossa-nova tempos (Dreams From Yesterday) and summery pop (A Wolf Who Wears Sheeps Clothes), choosing to foreground his keyboards over his guitars. Above all, he brings out a more personal side of his character. Maturity, without a doubt, and even more clearly, the desire to show that he is a serious songwriter. Because for all his affected nonchalance, Mac DeMarco has delivered a record that's very touching, and deeper than what we might have expected. © MZ/Qobuz